Marvel at the NYC street tree map
In the parks system, street trees are considered especially vital. In New York City, the dedicated citizens who care for them are members of an elite squad called TreesCount! These are their stories.
If you want to learn about animals, you can’t just study the ones in captivity. The same is true for bonsai. You have to visit trees out in the world. Observe their habits. See how they bend with the wind and stretch for light, how they flower and snake roots into the soil. It’s been a while since I’ve been able to get out into anything you could earnestly call nature, but while home I make do with New York’s street trees. Which is why I have the NYC Street Tree Map bookmarked on my browser.
Every 10 years or so since 1995, the city has organized a tree census to catalogue its street trees. In 2015, the organization TreesCount! enlisted over 2,000 volunteers to conduct the census, resulting in the world’s largest database of a city’s street trees with over 600,000 entries. Since then the database has been publicly accessible through an interactive map that lets you explore the city’s canopy block by block. The map notes each tree’s species, trunk diameter, and any recent activity logged by volunteer tree care groups such as weeding or working the soil. It is an astonishing amount of data and a remarkable public service.
As the trees leafed out this spring I’ve used the map as a glossary of different species in my neighborhood. When I find a new one, I try to note the bark, leaf shapes, and branch patterns. Now I recognize Norway maples and little leaf lindens all over the city.
Only a few tree species thrive in dense cities. City trees face pollution, salt runoff, poorly drained and compacted soil, and other stressors. Planters must match a tree to a location’s light and water conditions. They also select trees that grow in a narrow, upright fashion so as not to crowd the sidewalk with low branches. Many of the trees that make the cut aren’t from here, which is sometimes a problem for native species. Norway maples are more disease resistant than our native red maples, and the former are creeping through nearby forests. Bradford pears are popular for their narrow growth habit and showy white flowers, but they also make the air smell like semen, and their prodigious wandering seeds choke out local plant life.
Even in this semi-domesticated state, there’s a lot to learn from street trees. Why do some flower early while others of the same species on the next block are still bare? How do they naturally branch out, and how can I approximate these patterns with my own trees? When I started writing about food I took pains to educate my palate as much as possible. Now I feel like I’m developing a palate for trees. A greater awareness for how they exist in the world.
The tree map’s neatest feature may be these ecological stats with dollar values. Each tree comes with its own estimate based on its species and maturity. Granted these are all mathematical estimates, but I think it’s good for people to see concrete dollar amounts next to environmental news. We should get used to talking about the climate in hard financial terms, not just human factors.
We only got our meager covid aid when enough people started dying to affect the corporate bottom line. I suspect future half-measures in the climate crisis will work the same way.
Tree reading
A bonsai artist’s transformation of raw nursery stock into a styled bonsai in one year. The 22-minute video is beautifully produced and a real insight into the process. God, I know nothing. [Kottke]
Lauren Sloss has written a lovely article on California’s old growth redwood forests—how they exude a timeless serenity but are in fact changing all the time. [New York Times]